On Thursday Matthew Lukens wrote about the new Web workbook being required in Speech Communication 100 (Effective Speech). We created this Web workbook for a number of reasons.

First, we recently converted the course from a lecture-discussion format to small sections in response to student feedback.

The workbook provides some of the information we used to cover in the lecture and insures some uniformity in the course.

At the same time, we wanted to increase the use of technology in teaching the course. The workbook represents part of our efforts to update the course and keep it at the cutting edge of public speaking instruction.

We hope the Web workbook will accomplish not only these goals but, more importantly, provide a significant enhancement to students' education.

By providing interactive activities, links to other information sources, and additional information, the Web Workbook should improve the quality of their educational experience.

And by developing it this way rather than having students buy a workbook from a commercial publisher we have been able to keep costs down while providing the highest quality education.

I might add that the combined cost of the text and workbook ($67.35) is still less than that for most general education courses and less than Mr. Lukens pays in his major, engineering, where texts typically cost $75 to $100, and students pay additional fees for the courses.